Hot Lights in Paris
A time travel story
If time could fly,
then so would I,
if just to hear and laugh
with Django Reinhardt and maybe Edith Piaf,
but who could I be to even say
I knew which way
the whole wide world
was going to go?
Humans are funny.
We see the train coming,
but never do jump.
Casey Jones, stripped of bones,
and dancing in the sky.
The Grateful Dead in New Orleans,
watching out for Nixon’s cops
and opening the door
slowly.
Perhaps the buffalo know
from wherever they’ve gone.
Off to Mars, I hear,
painted in the sky.
On a bright night, you can see them, the old ways returned,
the rumble of their hooves,
and love not spurned.
But we humans in so-called reality, 2024,
are burning the planet
and still loving war.
If crying could teach us,
we’d all be PhDs.
If cruelty were outlawed,
what would we do?
Time travel, I guess.
If Django could see me, he’d laugh, too,
Edith on stage, putting time’s own glue
all over my chair.
I’m the guy at the back table,
teaching Henry Miller a new way
to write.
_______________________
© “John” Lesly Levin 2024
